George Clooney, who helped jump-start the modern era of the civically leveraged celebrity, said in 2011, "Celebrity can help focus news media where they have abdicated their responsibility." And, he added, from a dirt road in one of Africa's most political unstable regions, "If they're (the paparazzi) going to follow me anyway, I want them to follow me here (South Sudan)."

But the gold standard remains Angelina Jolie, the one-time wild child who reinvented herself as crusader for the imperiled and suffering. With no political office to lose, no reputation to be squandered and enough personal wealth to fund her pet projects, she's free to be a blunt media disruptor on ...